McCains’s spin machine, guns and making Hemingway proud

In early April John McCain held a top-dollar fundraiser at Washington’s Willard Hotel, where President Ulysses S. Grant invented the term “lobbyist.” It was a fitting locale, as the election-reform group Public Campaign noted, since thirty-five of the forty-three hosts for the evening were registered lobbyists. The following week Rick Davis–on leave from his job as a lobbyist to work as McCain’s campaign manager–gave a strategy presentation to lobbyists from the oil, utility and nuclear power industries, soliciting campaign contributions.

That McCain is up to his neck in shady lobbyists isn’t particularly news. What’s new is that McCain’s Reform Institute isn’t much more then some Potemkin front where his crony buddies got cuts of the funding that ran from $145,000 to $395,000 while promoting the of the goal of less special interest influence and cleaner elections. McCain’s little institute could bypass some of the funding limitations placed on his Political Action Committee, how convenient. Like much of Republican astroturf the Reform Institute did manage to con or convince some good people that they were actually trying to do something about campaign finance reform including George’ Soro’s Open Society and the Tide’s Foundation. The twists and turns that McCain and his good fellows took in promoting this fake reform agenda would make Tony Soprano blush. In a way I have to give McCain his due. I knew he could be as dirty as any of his Conservative cohorts, but didn’t realize that he could be as devious.

The “Hapless neo-Nazi of the Month” award goes to Paul Anthony Palmer, Jr.. The former Pittsburgh police officer was [1] sentenced June 20 to 52 months in federal prison after pleading guilty to possessing an unregistered explosive device,,

[ ]…Sometime after the accidental detonation, Palmer had yet another Aryan Nations symbol tattooed over the amputee nub of his left forearm, making him a living testament to the group’s motto: “Violence solves everything.”

I can’t agree with the majority opinion on overturning the hangun laws in D.C., but my casual opinion is that the ruling is likely to have little effect on state and local restrictions on guns such as licensing and background checks. Most liberals I know own a gun and I highly recommend everyone buy one – no snark intended. You can usually get a good used one discounted at a pawn shop. Take a class in its use and safety. If I was running for office I wouldn’t spend a dime of political capital on the gun issue except for background checks – there’s little reason to be selling guns to anyone with a previous conviction for rape or felony battery. The Right would never admit it, but a mass buying spree of guns by liberals would just piss them off and rob them of a non-issue to whine about.

If Republican pundits had a pair of ruby slippers they’d surely waste their one wish on getting everyone to believe that Iraq is exactly like WW II. Its unlikely that Cons will ever get over their FDR envy.

In an age when most reporters for the American media are timid, pasty, milquetoast mumblers, Lara Logan stands head and balls above the rest. Sure, we’ve seen some stories about her romantical adventures in Iraq’s Green Zone and an exciting brawl in a safe house between two rival suitors — and our only question is, Just two?

Much of the rumors about her have been exaggerated. Still good for her. As Wonkette notes this is the kind of corespondent that Hemingway would admire – blood, guts, reports dashed off in between bomb blasts and the occasinal tryst in the supply tent. The rumors/stories about male correspodents are legend, the only reason this one seems to be turning heads is because its a female reporter.